The hidden lives behind China’s great Internet firewall

Nature News · Mar 2, 2026 · Collected from RSS

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BOOK REVIEW 02 March 2026 The country’s tightly controlled digital ecosystem is replete with human stories and acts of subtle resistance. By Chris Stokel-Walker0 Chris Stokel-Walker Chris Stokel-Walker is a freelance journalist in Newcastle, UK. Many people in China use Internet cafes (such as this one in Beijing) to browse the web or play video games. Credit: Greg Baker/AFP/Getty The Wall Dancers: Searching for Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet Yi-Ling Liu Alfred A. Knopf (2026)China’s rise as a technological power has both admirers and critics. Over the past decade, the nation has built a vast digital ecosystem that enables people to perform many everyday tasks using a smartphone — from booking hospital appointments to paying for public transport. Supporters point to the model’s efficiency and convenience. Human-rights campaigners, however, argue that mechanisms such as the country’s social credit-scoring system, which can restrict access to jobs or travel because of perceived societal infractions deemed inappropriate by the Chinese state, pose serious risks to individual freedom.China’s shift towards ‘organized research’: how can coordination and innovation co-exist?Many will be familiar with China’s Great Firewall, a huge system of Internet filtering and surveillance that was first developed in the 1990s and became implemented in 2006. But little is known about how the online ecosystem operates in practice. Journalist Yi-Ling Liu’s debut book The Wall Dancers therefore provides a thrilling peek into the realities of this unique digital sphere.Liu tells the story of China’s Internet — often shaped by “coded puns and cryptic memes” to hoodwink censors — through the lives of six individuals, including the founder of the country’s largest gay social-networking app and a tech worker turned science-fiction writer. All are deemed “wall dancers” by Liu because they must “dance in shackles” — a metaphor coined by Sun Yunfeng, chief product designer for Internet-service provider Baidu in Beijing. Yunfeng used it in 2010 to describe how people in China must navigate life like performers on a stage with limited space, constrained by the shifting rules of the nation’s communist party.Why the world must wake up to China’s science leadershipChina was not always stuck behind a firewall. In the 1990s, “China embraced the revolutionary power of the internet”, writes Liu. The Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, for instance, established the first cable connection to the World Wide Web in 1994. Early adopters viewed the web through the lens of the jianghu — a mythical world filled with “mystery, heroism, and adventure”.In the book, Liu echoes that concept, with her own heroes and heroines leading the reader through an adventure that spans decades and continents. Some protagonists, including Lü Pin, a leading feminist activist, chose to leave China for more-open countries such as the United States. By following how politics and culture shaped people’s lives, Liu makes the story of the Chinese Internet more whole — and more human.Not all sunshine and rainbows Nature 651, 30-31 (2026) doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-026-00664-z Competing Interests The author declares no competing interests. Related Articles China’s shift towards ‘organized research’: how can coordination and innovation co-exist? China made waves with Deepseek, but its real ambition is AI-driven industrial innovation Why the world must wake up to China’s science leadership Subjects Latest on: Developing world Human behaviour Politics Making progress on global health will need high-quality evidence Editorial 15 JAN 26 A framework for addressing racial and related inequities in conservation Perspective 07 JAN 26 Food will be more affordable — if we double funds for agriculture research now Comment 09 DEC 25 Neanderthal dad, human mum: study reveals ancient procreation pattern News 26 FEB 26 What’s behind ‘teensplaining’? Scientists should study this adolescent behaviour Correspondence 17 FEB 26 AI agents are hiring human 'meatspace workers' — including some scientists News 13 FEB 26 White House stalls release of approved US science budgets News 27 FEB 26 COVID’s origins: what we do and don’t know Comment 24 FEB 26 Nuclear weapons testing is harmful — there’s no case for a restart Editorial 24 FEB 26